Cheap tools - Impossible feats of woodworking

<rant>According to the internet, nothing is possible because everything you need to do something is total crap. Your only hope is to spend as much money as possible in order to increase your odds that you get lucky and get a piece of crap that is slightly less crappy than all the other crap.

Anything available at big boxes is total junk.The Grizzly is mainly the same junk with different paint Jet is made in China now its just overpriced junkPM comes from the same factory as Jet and is just more expensive junkLaguna has the worst customer service and you’ll never be able to get the parts you need to fix your junk.Sawstop is run by the devil himself and once he is finally smote you won’t be able to get parts for his abominational junk

Give up and go to hand tools. Just be careful because a lot of the new ones are junk. The LNs and Veritas are less junky, but one wasn’t perfect once and considering the price they are junk. Get vintage stanley and restore it. Just be careful you don’t pick one up that is junk. </rant>

Lots of folks are doing great work with budget tools, and I thought it would be fun to post here some of your favorite tools that the internet would otherwise condemn to the scrap yard.

Anyone have any?

I’ll start: My bench top jointer from Shop Fox. Too small to actually do any good, but I’ve straightened plenty of boards none the less. Yes it has limits, but when I was in a very small space it was the only option for me, and it got the job done well.

-Brian

-- Part of engineering is to know when to put your calculator down and pick up your tools.

I guess that I’ll now have to throw out all of my tools ‘cause they are junk. Dang! Collecting all this junk for 40+ years has led me to this point? Does this mean that I’ll have to buy new junk? Wanna buy some old junk? Is my truck junk?Bill

One man’s junk is another mans treasure. LOL. I have bought “junk tools” and got a feel for how they work and if I will use them alot. Some yes and I upgrade when possible, others not really and they hang around and get used until they die and I have to decide what next.

One man s junk is another mans treasure. LOL. I have bought “junk tools” and got a feel for how they work and if I will use them alot. Some yes and I upgrade when possible, others not really and they hang around and get used until they die and I have to decide what next.

- woodbutcherbynight

A.K.A “The Harbor Freight Approach”

:)

-- Part of engineering is to know when to put your calculator down and pick up your tools.

I’ve got another one, which happens to be inspired by The Harbor Freight Approach.

I have an $8 set of bench chisels. They work great when they are sharp. They even stay sharp for up to 5 minutes. Everything I have needed to chisel, I have done with those chisels. The job got done, though the efficiency was not high. The silver lining is that I got a lot of sharpening practice, and I definitely still need it. So yeah, these are on my short list to upgrade. But I wouldn’t have gotten started if the only place to start was a set of $300 Veritas!

-Brian

-- Part of engineering is to know when to put your calculator down and pick up your tools.

I would only say to not give up on the machinery, just anything that was made in the last 40 years. Go get some old [fill in the US company name here] before it was sold to a [fill in the foreign country name here] outfit and became [fill in your choice of word equaling deification here].

I ve got another one, which happens to be inspired by The Harbor Freight Approach.

I have an $8 set of bench chisels. They work great when they are sharp. They even stay sharp for up to 5 minutes. Everything I have needed to chisel, I have done with those chisels. The job got done, though the efficiency was not high. The silver lining is that I got a lot of sharpening practice, and I definitely still need it. So yeah, these are on my short list to upgrade. But I wouldn t have gotten started if the only place to start was a set of $300 Veritas!

-Brian

- bbasiaga

I agree, I have a set from HF, use them for everything I should probably never use a chisel for. For $10 I have got alot of mileage out of them. Somewhere here recently I read about Narex chisels, not top of the ,line but an upgrade to the middle, small steps….. LOL

I like the “Harbor Freight Approach” comment inspires me to make a wall plaque with that on it. LOL.